Prepositions in Relative Clauses
B2-C1 Level
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When you move the preposition forward, two important changes happen. First, for people, you must use whom (not "who"): "to whom," "with whom," "for whom." Second, for things, you must use which (not "that"): "in which," "about which," "for which." You can never use "that" directly after a preposition — "the topic about that we discussed" is wrong. In Cambridge B2 First and C1 Advanced exams, sentence transformation tasks often require you to change informal preposition-final structures into formal preposition-fronted ones, so practising both positions is essential.
Quick Rule
informal: who/which/that ... preposition | formal: preposition + whom (people) / which (things)
- 1.The colleague to whom I sent the email has not replied. (formal — preposition before whom)
- 2.She raised a topic about which they argued for hours. (formal — preposition before which)
- 3.That's the school which I went to as a child. (informal — preposition at the end)
- 4.The reason for which she resigned was never made public. (formal — preposition before which)
- 5.I don't know the person with whom he was speaking. (formal — preposition before whom, negative)
All 20 questions
Rewrite each sentence in BOTH formal and informal styles. Formal: preposition before 'which/whom'. Informal: preposition at end. Enter the formal version.
The house that I live in is very old. (Rewrite formally)
The house
The city that I grew up in is beautiful. (Rewrite formally)
The city
The chair that I was sitting on was uncomfortable. (Rewrite formally)
The chair
The topic that we talked about was interesting. (Rewrite formally)
The topic
The company that I work for is expanding. (Rewrite formally)
The company
The hotel that we stayed at was excellent. (Rewrite formally)
The hotel
The project that I was working on has finished. (Rewrite formally)
The project
The reason that I left for was personal. (Rewrite formally)
The reason
The box that the gift came in was beautiful. (Rewrite formally)
The box
The school that I went to was very strict. (Rewrite formally)
The school
The issue that we need to deal with is urgent. (Rewrite formally)
The issue
The theory that the research is based on is controversial. (Rewrite formally)
The theory
The problem that they are complaining about is serious. (Rewrite formally)
The problem
The conference that I presented at was well-attended. (Rewrite formally)
The conference
The evidence that the decision was based on was weak. (Rewrite formally)
The evidence
The country that I come from is in Asia. (Rewrite formally)
The country
The period that we are referring to was difficult. (Rewrite formally)
The period
The principles that the organization stands for are important. (Rewrite formally)
The principles
The criteria that candidates are judged by are strict. (Rewrite formally)
The criteria
The method that we solved the problem with was innovative. (Rewrite formally)
The method
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